Patrick O'Donovan (Limerick County, Fine Gael)
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This depends on circumstances. I refer, for example, to the locations where the OPW is asked to find office accommodation or circumstances where, for argument’s sake, a tribunal is established, a change of Department occurs or an agency needs to expand. Sometimes, we just do not have a choice but to take out a lease. It is not our preferred option. Our preferred option is to consolidate leases and, where possible, to extinguish them.

Here in Dublin, for instance, the development of Tom Johnson House, which is located in Beggar’s Bush, will release a significant amount of office accommodation. We will be able to move one of the Departments there. The same will be the case with Leeson Lane, where we have a mix of a new, contemporary building and an old, architecturally conserved building. It takes a great deal of time to bring these buildings to a stage where they can be occupied.

In the absence of that, sometimes, whether you like it or not, you have to take out a lease because the demands on a particular Department, new agency, tribunal, inquiry or whatever have to be accommodated. In that context, when leases are extinguished and our own accommodation becomes available, we try and move people. Obviously, as the Deputy will appreciate, some people do not want to be moved. Often there are tough, difficult conversations in terms of moving people.

Our movement is towards consolidating into our own space and recognising that, even in my own headquarters here in Dublin, the days of having everybody having his or her own work station is something that we will have to revisit. It will not be feasible or plausible in the future to have 100% of the people have 100% office accommodation in perpetuity when maybe there is 40%, 50% or 60% occupancy on any one day. We have to look at doing things differently. That will involve discussions with employee representatives and management. It is certainly something that the Office of Public Works is conscious of. We have written to Secretaries General of Departments asking them for ideas as to how they can reduce their footprint because that, in turn, reduces our lease need and how they are embracing new forms of working.

Ultimately, it is up to each Accounting Officer - each Secretary General of a Department - to deploy the staff that they have and to find office accommodation for them. Then the demands come on us if additional accommodation is required, and often that comes by way of a Government decision.